Cometa Raketa AMIA Space, Interview with Diego Gravinese

(Images: works in the show Cometa Raketa. Credit: Gravinese Diego.) Was identified as a new artist by Clarin 1999 and defined as “hyperrealist pop artist and painter” by Page 12 in 2003. He exhibited in New York, Los Angeles, Porto Alegre and Berlin. He lived in Manhattan until the Twin Towers fell. In 2005, The Nation said drawings giving away who offered to work with your sample. He worked with the designer Valeria Pesqueira for a limited edition T-shirt, with the group Packets for sample and painted a pair of Nike shoes. Away from the bustle of Palermo, was installed in a house in the neighborhood of Boulogne, where he lives with a young Australian called adorable Panda, whom he met through the site Flickr.

It is the prolific, something unclassifiable, but always interesting artist Diego Gravinese, who after a long period without exposing occur until late September sample Cometa Raketa in the space of art from the Asociación Mutual Israelita de Argentina (AMIA).

In order to know more about their sample, his artistic direction at the moment and its views on the contemporary art scene in Buenos Aires, BA Inspiration Gravinese spoke and then introduced the result of the exchange.

BA Inspiration (BAI): What is the sample Cometa Raketa?
Gravinese Diego (DG): Cometa Raketa is my more optimistic. In that sense, could say that these paintings are celebratory. They are like totems, offering a kind of. Girls, the cockatoo and the plant represent everything that is alive, born and die on this earth. I did not realize at first, but was making a kind of secular trinity between plants, animals and women. The title of the exhibition (I took the pseudonym of a Russian photographer author of one of the photos) refers to a kind of parallel world and wandering. A world that is very similar to this, but this is not exactly.

“Cometa Raketa is my more optimistic. Girls, the cockatoo and the plant represent everything that is alive, born and die on this earth”.

BAI: -How would you describe the evolution of your work since you started until now?, What topics interest you and which ceased to dominate your work at the moment?
DG: I would say that I was evolving toward ‘Table '. I started, ago 15 years old, making some outrageous comics species, and then began to divide the canvas as a map or a free, adding images from photos. Details “Photographic” of my first jobs was gaining ground until finally fill the entire canvas. In this series I decided to strip me of any element of design and overlapping of layers, finally, concentrate on a single image for web. Its, somehow, my pictures more classic and simple in that sense.

BAI: As I mentioned before, in this series is a marked presence of women in intimate or something everyday situations, What attracts you to these scenes and the female world?, The photos are of people you know?
DG: The female world is fascinating. I do not know if it has to do with the fact of having grown up surrounded by my sisters and all the rituals of her world of girls or what, but always grew up thinking that the world is not going to be a better place until the man returned to the woman's true power. Machismo has not given anything but pain and 4x4s. And, however, insist. The photos for the pictures are of girls I know, except for one image, I gave it Kometa Raketa, Russian photographer I mentioned earlier, whom I met online. In fact, in two of the tables, the hero is my beautiful girlfriend, Panda.

One of the works of Cometa Raketa in which the protagonist is Panda, Gravinese's partner.

BAI: You had success very young and you could spread out internationally, What way did that affect your work and your personality?
DG: Is natural to expand. Everything that grows as it feeds and cares. I did not realize he was doing anything exceptional to want to exhibit in New York and Europe and stuff. I lived through it all as part of a normal process. As I said, I think- Vito Acconci, “an artist can only talk about one or two things I know”. Then, after a time to show my stuff in Buenos Aires decided it was time to move on and show them on the other side and it was.

BAI: You lived a time in New York, What do you miss Buenos Aires when you were there and what led you to return?
DG: The years in New York were super exciting and I really missed. In fact, I fell much more than to return to Buenos Aires before I left. The decision to return was rather the decision to stay: I had come to Buenos Aires to withdraw my work visa to return and settle there and the next day the Twin Towers fell. That kept me for six months in Buenos Aires and some key things in my personal life during this half year (plus the confusion that existed in New York) made me stay. It was like starting another life, almost literally.

“I always grew up thinking that the world is not going to be a better place until the man returned to the woman's true power. Machismo has not given anything but pain and 4x4s”.

BAI: The contemporary art scene in the city grew considerably in recent years (good and not so good expressions), How do you dress your back?, How do you see at this time?, What you are interested artists and galleries?
DG: True, the art scene has grown a lot in the city. But I think that is the same internationally. And I understand what you mean good and not-so-good. I am glad that this has been so, but from there to interest me in general production is a distance. I like many artists, some well-known as Leandro Erlich, Nahuel Vecino, Emiliano Miliyo, Tripe and Nicholas Constantine, among others, and many others whom I have not seen enough yet, but some works I have really enjoyed: Leo Estol, Max Channel, Valentina Liernur and Juan Tess are the names that come quickly to mind.

BAI: Besides your paint production, What other projects are you working on now?
DG: In recent years I became involved with fashion, design and rock, and also did things for me in photography. Panda now I'm working on some specific private projects. But the truth, is the return to painting, and especially in the rediscovery of Oil, where is my mind at this time. The painting is definitely the place I want to stay.

The work born of an image belonging to a Russian photographer who met online Gravinese. Unfortunately was removed from the walls of the AMIA was considered too daring.

BAI: In one interview you said you're a nerd, What things are you interested in technology?
DG: I love computers, and the whole digital world. Paraphrasing Jodorowsky, iPhones am! But I have a special fetish for gadgets on its own or aided design, is rather a love for the systems and how we understand its operation to the point of cyber play them. At this point hallucinate with (experiment) ATLAS at the CERN. Some of that interest and quantum particle theory creeps into my work, in the way that the flat surface of the table is nothing more than the sum of millions of abstract points that create the illusion of reality. After all, What is reality, but an illusion of the senses? Behind the appearance of other living things vibrant and abstract world of particles and energy.

BAI: Last, What do you like in Buenos Aires?, What is your corner / shop / subtracted favorite city?
DG: Buenos Aires is amazing and I'm rediscovering through the eyes of Panda. Things I like most is perhaps the National Library, the Palacio Barolo and walk Eleven.

Gravinese Diego (Official Site)
Gravinese Diego (Paintings on Flickr)
Diego Gravinese AMIA Space
Another interview to Gravinese in Dioramas